COURTHOUSE CONVERGENCE

Never has security been so tight for the swearing-in
of a federal judge.

It is hard to say whether it was good timing or bad
timing for the public ceremonies putting Len Stark on
the U.S. District Court to happen Friday in Wilmington.

It was scheduled ages ago, when no one had any idea
that Barack Obama and Joe Biden would have this very
same window in their schedule to blitz into town for a
campaign event for Chris Coons, the Democrats'
senatorial candidate, at the Grand Opera House with the
federal courthouse practically at its back door.

The presidential security was thick. Getting in the
courthouse was only several steps less complicated than
getting out the miners in Chile.

It did mean, however, that Biden was able to breeze
into his old stomping grounds, the King Street
courthouse where his Senate office used to be, to attend
Stark's oath taking.

The making of a federal judge is a moment that is
irresistible to the Delaware political class. Maybe it
is the envy of a lifetime appointment.

The gathering drew not just Biden, but the two
Democratic senators, the Republican congressman and the
Democratic attorney general (who got a fatherly kiss
from the Democratic vice president), along with various
judges and numerous lawyers.

The place was so packed, there were no seats left
when Coons and Jack Markell, the Democratic governor,
arrived late from the Grand Opera House. This was some
serious standing room only.

Biden was like a political Caesar. He came, he spoke,
he left.

Biden was there and gone, all in about 10 minutes,
long enough to kid with Chief Judge Greg Sleet in what
turned out to be a witty tutorial on constitutional
checks and balances.

The two go way back. As a senator, Biden was the
driving force to get Sleet appointed to be the U.S.
attorney and then to go on the bench. Sleet, with the
mantle of the judicial branch upon him, pretended he was
going to keep the executive branch at bay.

"The fact is, he can't reverse me, so I'm first going
to recognize -- obviously I'm kidding -- I'm first going
to recognize the vice president of the United States of
America," Sleet said.

"Mr. Vice President, you're in my courtroom now."

"May it please the court," Biden quipped, only to
follow his show of respect for a co-equal branch of
government by reasserting executive power.

"I can't overrule him, but this is as far as he's
going. Only kidding, Greg. Only kidding, Your Honor."

Stark marveled at the confluence of events -- "That
the vice president was able to be here with us, I'm
without words" -- but it easily became evident that
Stark was something special himself.

Stark had barely put on his robe when speakers at the
event suggested that the Supreme Court was not out of
reach for him. No pressure, Your Honor.

He is a University of Delaware graduate, finishing
his four years there with two bachelor's and a master's
degree. He was a Rhodes scholar at Oxford and went to
law school at Yale. Not to mention how he is recognized
for his intellect, his easy humor and gentle good will.

Stark is not new to the bench. He was a federal
magistrate judge, a lesser judicial officer, for three
years before a presidential nomination elevated him to
the judgeship. He actually began it in August, after the
Senate confirmed him, but the public investiture was
delayed until now.

"If I had the power to do it, I wish everyone could
feel as good as I do now," he said.

Stark's appointment was not only a cause for
celebration, but relief. The court system has been so
shorthanded for so long, it could be a blip all its own
in the state's unemployment rate.

Federal appointments rarely proceed speedily, but
these days the process is all but stalled. The
four-judge court has not been at full strength since
Kent Jordan was promoted to the Third Circuit Court of
Appeals in 2006. Just as Stark was being confirmed for
that spot, Judge Joe Farnan retired.

Now the court needs a magistrate judge to replace
Stark. In addition, the wait goes on for a U.S. attorney
with Charlie Oberly, the former Democratic attorney
general, nominated but not confirmed.

Speakers from Sleet to Biden noted the drag of the
vacancies, but none more effectively than Stark himself,
as he acknowledged Farnan's presence at the ceremony and
relayed how much his ex-colleagues missed him.